They’d ask me what I’d do when finally I could not hear. If it were not the question that haunted me day in and out I would concede what a good question it was.
I am a composer, for as long as my ears will allow. I am no Beethoven, I cannot discern melody and harmony from the abyss and create majesty from mournful and angry vibrations. Tears stain my cheeks every night as I attempt to console myself with him as my inspiration. But I practice. I ruin sheet after sheet of frenzied score as I pull from all my years of theory training the orchestrations of song. Checking them over and over and over, the next day I play what I’ve written.
It’s shit. I am shit. I am lost. What am I to do when the hearing goes for good? As it is I cannot hear the fullness of music. I am losing my grip on tone. I am done for.
And even if I should lay composing to rest and find some other hobby, I agonize over the passage of time. Music fills the corners of life in every way.
What am I to do when there is no more music to be had? When all I’m left with are vibrations and color?
